It seems like every fucking game is trying to incorporate features of MMORPGs.   Back in the good old days skill-based games like starcraft, counter-strike, AOE II, and CivII were kept entirely separate from grind-based games like everquest.    Then WC3 came along as an RTS with "hero units" that "level up" and all that MMORPG bullshit.   Age of Mythology did the same shit.   The civilization series felt that "veteran" units weren't enough and invented a whole BS tech tree of level-ups for units.   Age of Empires III implemented unlockable shit that totally unbalanced the RTS.   TF2 (Valve's next significant fps after counter-strike source) started out as a pure skill game but then for some inexplicable reason they decided to mingle it with MMORPG bullshit through an achievement system that unlocked additional items.  Now it is no longer a pure SKILL game, but is based heavily on how much time you spent GRINDING on achievement servers for the limited-availability items.

Now, I've got nothing against MMORPGs themselves.  I just like to keep that kind of crap SEPARATE from my FPS and RTS games.     Nowadays, almost every new FPS or RTS game throws in some unlockable bullshit that upsets the perfect balance (think original starcraft) that a game is supposed to have.   This really irritates me.  I play these games for a change of pace from WoW, not to do the same shit.

Good Cheap stuff:

eggs

rice

bananas

mixed nuts

dried papayas

  Good Medium-priced stuff:

Milk

Apples

Turkey

Chicken

Dark Chocolate

Whole wheat bread

Expensive stuff:

V8

Guacamole

Stuff to minimize because it's unhealthy:

all soft drinks

all alcohol

all caffeine (except dark chocolate)

most chips / pretzels

most restaraunts

Beef

Pork/Ham/Bacon

hot pockets and similar crap

ice cream / candy

desserts in general

Stuff to avoid because it tastes/feels like shit:

Broccoli

Cabbage

Green Beans

Alcohol

Stuff to avoid because it's overpriced:

almost all restaraunts

Pizza

Processed/prepared foods

Alcohol

 http://www.videosift.com/video/The-Daily-Show-4-21-09-The-Stockholm-Syndrome#comment-742409

The Trouble is that ranking order determines the number of views, which determines the vote count, which determines the ranking order.  This is self-reinforcing, and amplifies random noise such as the number of people who were online at the time the video was submitted.  To get a more accurate ranking of videos there are some countermeasures we might try:

0.  Introduce some randomness to the default sort order

1.  Each view of a video (from a distinct user) subtracts a small fraction from its vote count

2.  Only videos found through searching or "random" mode can be voted.  If a user arrives at a video through a top-list, he cannot vote for it.  Videosift doesn't have enough traffic volume to try this approach, but YT does.

Normally, the tap water has so many dissolved gasses and salts that I can't see through it when it first comes out of the tap, but if you let the water sit for a minute or two the gas bubbles come to the top and it becomes transparent.   Also, it has so much dissolved salts that putting tap water in a pot and boiling off 20% of it leaves a visible precipitate/residue on the bottom of the pot.    This fucking sucks.   If you run the cold water for >5 minutes before filling up from it, it comes out clear.  But the excessive dissolved crap problem is still there.   You can't boil off 20% of it without forming a precipitate.   It probably isn't healthy to drink water that has so much dissolved crap in it.   I looked up their test results, which meet LEGAL limits but don't meet EPA health guidelines or California public health goals:

http://www.ewg.org/tapwater/yourwater/system.php?pwsid=NE3110926

It's interesting how the text differs drastically from what was done in Iraq and Afghanistan.   It was specifically to avoid having a ton of disgruntled unemployed ex-soldiers:

We hereby proclaim the unconditional surrender to the Allied Powers of the Japanese Imperial General Headquarters and of all Japanese Armed Forces and all Armed Forces under Japanese control wherever situated.

We hereby command all Japanese forces wherever situated and the Japanese people to cease hostilities forthwith, to preserve and save from damage all ships, aircraft, and military and civil property, and to comply with all requirements which may be imposed by the Supreme Commander for the Allied Powers or by agencies of the Japanese Government at his direction.

We hereby command the Japanese Imperial General Headquarters to issue at once orders to the commanders of all Japanese forces and all forces under Japanese control wherever situated to surrender unconditionally themselves and all forces under their control.

We hereby command all civil, military, and naval officials to obey and enforce all proclamations, orders, and directives deemed by the Supreme Commander for the Allied Powers to be proper to effectuate this surrender and issued by him or under his authority; and we direct all such officials to remain at their posts and to continue to perform their non-combatant duties unless specifically relieved by him or under his authority.

We hereby undertake for the Emperor, the Japanese Government, and their successors to carry out the provisions of the Potsdam Declaration in good faith, and to issue whatever orders and take whatever action may be required by the Supreme Commander for the Allied Powers or by any other designated representative of the Allied Powers for the purpose of giving effect to that declaration.

We hereby command the Japanese Imperial Government and the Japanese Imperial General Headquarters at once to liberate all Allied Prisoners of War and civilian internees now under Japanese control and to provide for their protection, care, maintenance, and immediate transportation to places as directed.

The authority of the Emperor and the Japanese Government to rule the State shall be subject to the Supreme Commander for the Allied Powers, who will take such steps as he deems proper to effectuate these terms of surrender.

Signed at TOKYO BAY, JAPAN at 09.04 on the SECOND day of SEPTEMBER, 1945

Mamoru Shigemitsu
By Command and in behalf of the Emperor of Japan and the Japanese Government

Yoshijirō Umezu
By Command and in behalf of the Japanese Imperial General Headquarters

Accepted at TOKYO BAY, JAPAN at 0908 on the SECOND day of SEPTEMBER, 1945, for the United States, Republic of China, United Kingdom and the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics, and in the interests of the other United Nations at war with Japan.

Douglas MacArthur
Supreme Commander for the Allied Powers

C.W. Nimitz
United States Representative

Hsu Yung-Ch'ang
Republic of China Representative

Bruce Fraser
United Kingdom Representative

Kuzma Derevyanko
Union of Soviet Socialist Republics Representative

Thomas Blamey
Commonwealth of Australia Representative

L. Moore Cosgrave
Dominion of Canada Representative

Jacques Leclerc
Provisional Government of the French Republic Representative

C.E.L. Helfrich
Kingdom of the Netherlands Representative

Leonard M. Isitt
Dominion of New Zealand Representative

The way most of the scientific literature is split up over 100 different pay-sites with 100 different logins and outrageous pricing schemes ($20 an article!) is a pain in the ass that retards the progress of science.   When I publish stuff I'm going to GPL it so that it will be *illegal* for derivative works to be sold exclusively on pay-sites.  That's the way science is supposed to be: free and open to the world.

Also, fuck the tradition that requires every advanced degree to be hyperspecialized to the point of tunnel-vision.

It's bloatware, with a shitty interface.  They really should have put more thought into the multiplayer server-finding interface.

 It is:

1. Hidden below 4 or 5 layers of menus with a bloatware "animated book" thing slowing down every command.

2. Lacking any ability to filter by ping, number of users playing, etc.  These are basic features that have existed in every good multiplayer game for over 10 years.

Any multiplayer game without a good interface for finding servers is like a car without any engine.  They really should put at least as much effort into the server-finding interface as they put into the bloatware graphics.   The original Call of Duty, the original Unreal Tournament, and CS:S are all superior to Far Cry 2 for multiplayer.

 So it was a total waste of money.   TF2 is still king.

Here are three kinds of income:

1. Someone is paid to do something useful

This is ordinary, productive work.

2. Someone is paid unconditionally

This is wealth redistribution

3.  Someone is paid to do something useless

This is like wealth redistribution in that the payer recieves nothing significant in return. However the reciever is required to destroy his income by wasting the time-equivalent of it.    In that manner, it is always worse than #2.   #3 is the cousin of the broken window fallacy.   The BWF argues that breaking a window is a net gain for the economy via employing all the people involved in fixing it, and secondarily all the people with whom those artisans spend their income.    In reality, the broken window is a net loss, because the money spent to repair it would have been spent in some other way.     All labour and capital will be used in some way (in the broadest sense) no matter what, and the trick is ensuring that it is used productively.   In the long run, the effect of any stimulus package will be measured in terms of the amount of productive work it accomplishes, and how efficiently it accomplishes this, not how many questionably-necessary jobs it creates.

Even the politicians who favor stem cell research tend to give undue deference to the ridiculous argument that use of embryonic stem cells should be avoided if possible, with this sort of language:

"The involved scientists should be allowed to continue using embryos left over from in vitro fertilization, which would otherwise be destroyed, until such time as they are clearly able to produce stem cells from other sources that achieve the objectives."

At the stage at which they are useful for stem cell production, embryos consist of less than 150 identical cells.   There is not even the beginning of specialization into nerve cells that would give rise to the possibility of personhood.

It would be wrong to *damage* a 150-cell embryo in such a way that it continues to develop into a person but the future person will suffer as a result of the damage.

But there is nothing wrong at all with simply destroying a 150-cell embryo with the consent of the parents (it is no worse than if the embryo had never been made in the first place)